Tamaoka Kofun Cluster: A Group of Kofun-Period Burial Mounds in Japan
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 3.9
- Popularity
- Very Low
- Country
- Japan
- Primary era
- Medieval
- Eras represented
- Classical, Medieval
- Civilizations
- Yamato
- Site type
- Burial
- Remains
- Necropolis
On this page13 sections
History
The Tamaoka Kofun Cluster is a group of seven ancient Japanese burial mounds in Kasai, Japan, built from the late fourth to the mid-fifth century during the Kofun period, a time when monumental tombs were constructed for members of the elite. Shinozuka Kofun belongs to the later Kofun period. The group occupies part of what was once a much larger concentration of more than 30 tumuli in the Shinya, Tamaoka, and Tamano neighborhoods of Kasai, Hyogo Prefecture.
The Kofun-period group
The surviving cluster includes Tamaoka Kofun, Baizuka No. 1 and No. 2 Kofun, Dantōzuka Kofun, Kuwanzuka Kofun, Shinozuka Kofun, and the reconstructed and relocated Aizen Kofun. Together, these mounds represent several burial traditions, including keyhole-shaped tombs with a circular rear section and a projecting front section, circular mounds, and a square mound. Their chambers include both pit-type and horizontal-entry stone forms.
The wider group was reduced when most of the surrounding mounds were destroyed during residential development. Tamaoka Kofun received designation as a National Historic Site in 1943. The other mounds were added to the protected area in 1978, and the protected area was expanded in 1997. The surviving remains are now incorporated into Tamaoka Historic Park, which includes ponds and is used for public recreation and observation of nature.
Tradition and historical interpretation
The eighth-century Harima Fudoki, a provincial gazetteer preserving geographical, historical, and legendary traditions from the Harima region, associates the Tamaoka mound with the tragic love story of Nehime and two princes. This tradition forms part of the later historical and cultural interpretation attached to the mound.
Remains
The cluster extends across a long terrace on the east bank of the Kakogawa River. Its surviving mounds preserve varied forms, burial chambers, moats, and funerary objects. The physical remains also show how individual tombs differed in scale, construction, orientation, and treatment of the surrounding ground.
Tamaoka and its subsidiary mounds
Tamaoka Kofun
Tamaoka Kofun is a keyhole-shaped mound about 109 meters long. Its projecting front section is approximately 54 meters wide, while the circular rear section has a diameter of about 64 meters. It was built in three tiers and enclosed by a moat roughly 20 meters wide. These dimensions make it one of the largest kofun in Hyogo Prefecture.
Excavations produced numerous cylindrical haniwa, clay funerary objects placed on or around burial mounds, together with figurative examples shaped as houses and chickens. The finds indicate that many cylindrical haniwa stood along the outer embankment. The burial chamber was robbed in antiquity. A hole remains in the center of the rear section, and the surviving remains of a tuff sarcophagus can be seen there.
Baizuka No. 1 Kofun
Baizuka No. 1 is a subsidiary mound east of Tamaoka Kofun. It is now a circular mound about 25 meters in diameter, although severe alteration has raised the possibility that it originally had a keyhole shape. Haniwa and fragments of tuff were found in its surrounding moat, which has been modified repeatedly. The mound dates from the middle Kofun period.
Baizuka No. 2 Kofun
Baizuka No. 2 is a square mound with sides of about 24 meters, positioned west of Tamaoka Kofun. Much of the mound has been cut away. Haniwa and tuff fragments were recovered from its altered moat, and the tomb also dates from the middle Kofun period.
Other burial mounds
Dantōzuka Kofun
Dantōzuka Kofun is a circular mound about 17 meters in diameter, approximately 110 meters southeast of Tamaoka Kofun. It dates from the middle Kofun period, probably the first half of the fifth century. A moat or ditch about 2 to 3 meters wide surrounded the mound, and fragments of cylindrical haniwa were recovered from it.
A horizontal-entry stone burial chamber opens toward the south. Most of its stonework, including the ceiling, has been removed, leaving the chamber fragmentary.
Kuwanzuka Kofun
Kuwanzuka Kofun stands approximately 170 meters west of Tamaoka Kofun. It is a two-tiered circular mound about 35 meters in diameter, constructed on a square embankment. Cylindrical and figurative haniwa have been found there.
A pit-type stone burial chamber survives at the top of the mound. It is thought to have contained a split-bamboo-shaped wooden coffin. Many of the stones were probably removed, and most burial goods were robbed in antiquity. Surviving grave goods include fragments of swords and straight swords, a triangular-plate leather-laced short cuirass, halberds, and agricultural tools such as axes. Other finds comprise chicken-shaped haniwa, pottery, and shaped clay objects in pestle, rod, knobbed-rod, disk, and basket-patterned forms.
Shinozuka Kofun
Shinozuka Kofun is a keyhole-shaped mound from the late Kofun period, oriented eastward. It measures about 51 meters in length, with an anterior section approximately 16 meters wide and a circular rear section about 43 meters in diameter. A pit-type stone burial chamber is exposed at the top of the rear section. Traces of a moat roughly 10 meters wide remain, and both cylindrical and figurative haniwa have been recovered.
Aizen Kofun
Aizen Kofun is a reconstructed circular mound about 18 meters in diameter. It contains a horizontal-entry burial chamber with a sarcophagus and fragments of Sue ware, a high-fired gray Japanese ceramic tradition associated with Kofun-period funerary and elite contexts. The mound originally stood at Azajoten-ji Temple in Kasai’s Satani neighborhood before being relocated to its present position.
